


Nothing to Lose and No More to Win

by ThatwasJustaDream



Category: Supernatural
Genre: M/M, S9 plot mentions, Sastiel - Freeform, permanently broken dean
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-27
Updated: 2014-04-27
Packaged: 2018-01-20 23:14:36
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,676
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1529330
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThatwasJustaDream/pseuds/ThatwasJustaDream
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After Abaddon and the mark, Dean's tale becomes a damnation story. And then, when there's nowhere left to turn, Sam and Castiel turn to each other.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Nothing to Lose and No More to Win

**Author's Note:**

> This was written as part of a weekend challenge on the 1_million_words comm on LJ. The prompt: Rare pairs and sand, which led to this bit of darkness- broken Destiel, and my first ever attempt at Sastiel.

In the end, they won: Metatron dead, Abaddon destroyed, Crowley contained. Dean, though? He lost. _Was_ lost. 

No one said it out loud, but they all knew; taking on the mark cost him more than he had to spend. It left him busted physically in ways Castiel could only partially heal, and drained his heart of the little warmth left in it. Add the fact he’d also nearly cost Cas his existence and he’d pushed Sam even further away? All Dean had in the tank now was _angry_ and _bitter_ and he’d been serving them up in equal parts ever since.

“You two planning to sit with your noses in those damn books all night, or are we getting dinner?”

Cas’ gaze stayed down, aimed at the library table, jaw tightening. Dean saw Sam’s eyes shoot over to Cas, worried. About what? That Cas would snap back at him? Was Cas that close to telling him to fuck off and die?

“How about I go pick something up for us?” Sam suggested, voice soft and neutral and yeah… like he needed that. 

Fricking condescending.

“No,” Dean waved an arm, turning. “You two stay. Read on, geek out, whatever. I’ll go.”

He barely saw the road the whole food run, he was too absorbed in thoughts of how close he’d come to finding a home, a family of hunters. They all should be in the bunker tonight; Kevin, Charlie, Cas and Sam talking, laughing, making a meal, finding their spots afterward to curl up, stretch out, play on their phones and watch a movie. 

He was going to end up alone, instead. He could feel it, almost picture it; grains of sand sliding through thin channels in a row of tiny hourglasses. If he let the next one run out? Cas would be gone. Another? Sam would take off. Then, the last one would measure the miserable, final years of his life -- until something he was hunting got the jump on him or he pointed his own gun at the roof of his mouth. 

“Morbid much?” He grumbled to himself as he walked toward the bunker door, pizza box hot against the palm of one hand and a twelve-bottle box of beer heavy in the other. 

Maybe there was still time.

Or not.

“How does that feel?” He heard Cas’ voice, heavy with extra gravel in it. “Better?”

They were sitting right below him, backs to him on the sofa and turned toward each other.

“Yes,” Sam breathed it, still leaning forward, eyes closed. “So much better. Thank you.”

There was nothing odd about the sight, at first. Sam was still getting headaches, blurred vision, too, from what Gadreel had put him through. Cas had been treating them each a few times a week, expending some of his own still-healing grace to mend them. Something about it made Dean stop flat, though; the way Sam was leaning in, how Cas was flipping back a strand of Sam’s hair, stroking the side of his jaw with the palm of his hand, tugging at an earlobe with his finger and thumb….

“Sam…” Castiel said, Cas who never used to touch Sam when he healed him, just ran hands over him, above him, so when the hell did that change and why hadn’t he noticed it ‘til now? “Sam, open your eyes. Please.”

Sam did, and from where he stood Dean could see the corner of his mouth go up in a soft, hazy smile as Castiel leaned in to kiss him. It was notable how Sam did not push him away, didn’t say _‘Cas, what the hell, man?’_ as their lips brushed once, twice, so slowly and then pressed together over and over – tongues flicking, tasting.

Dean wanted to turn and run but there were two problems: First it was dead silent other than the wet, sucking sounds of their kiss deepening. The beers would clink in the box, would startle them. Second, he couldn’t feel his feet, his legs. It was like being in a waking dream where you know you’re out but you can’t move. It’s why he was still there to see Sam slide back on the couch and pull Cas over him, to watch their bodies slot together immediately – the way they only do once you’ve done it together a dozen times. Cas’ left leg hitched over Sam’s hip and now they were grinding, picking up speed, Sam’s tongue halfway down Cas’ throat from the muffled, wounded sounds Cas was making. They didn’t even seem to be accounting for time – there was no breaking away to murmur, ‘hurry, he’ll be back soon,’ just shirts pulled loose, fingers fumbling with buttons and snaps, a huge hand sliding hard into Cas’ pants, making him whine and buck and…..

Dean didn’t need to worry about them hearing the bottles clink anymore.

He was outside, box on the ground at his feet, the pizza balanced on top of it and for a second he thought he might need a trashcan or a gutter to puke in. Then, they settled – his guts, his heart, his heaving chest and ….why did he care? 

Because he did, that’s why.

He played it over in his head; the way they’d been talking to each other down there, so gently. When was the last time he’d given Castiel a single word in that tone? Years? Ever? Last time Cas touched him any way but clinical, he’d thrown him off and told him to drop a dime if he found Heaven.

“Oh, no,” he felt the grains of sand falling faster, faster, an hourglass emptying, another one close …. and then the street around him went silent. Hollow. The whole world went hollow. “Oh, no.”

~*~

_Much further down the road…._

Sam sat on the edge of what had been, ‘til last night, his brother’s bed, and pulled a letter in his own writing from a yellowing envelope. A school picture of Lily nearly fell to the floor, but he caught it in time. Then he read, his heart pounding, his throat tight.

_She’s ten now, Dean. Skipped a grade, and is in sixth. She’s as spare with her words as ever, but math? It makes my head spin, what she can do. Must be Cas, the seraphim in her. She has stopped teleporting the rare times she pitches a pre-teen fit, which is nice – he doesn’t have to chase her around time and space so much. He always knows how to find her, she’s never gone for long, but it’s scary when she disappears like that._

Sam kissed her picture and folded it all back up. Then he found the second letter nested inside the envelope-- shorter, to the point. Much more recent.

_Dean, I wanted to let you know Castiel has gone home. It’s for the best. He’s brokering the détente between Heaven and Hell now that it’s gotten very fragile again. We’ve agreed it’s far more important, at this point, than our own little lives. Lily is hurting, but she knows she’ll see him, sometimes. He and I agreed we won’t see each other anymore. It would be too difficult, so….. I wish you would let me come visit. I wish you’d meet Lily. Cas asked me to tell you that he says goodbye…”_

Dean never responded. But apparently he’d kept the letters on his nightstand, under the picture of their mother. All this time.

Sam would have lost it then, if a voice hadn’t sent him almost through the roof.

“Don’t panic. It’s just ancient, old me – alone and unarmed. You’re looking well, Sam-I-Am. I see you have a touch of grey, but it kind of suits you anyway. Very smooth… professorly. Or is it professorish? ”

“Professorial,” Sam swallowed hard. “And you know it. You look undeservedly well, yourself, Crowley.”

“Ah yes, thanks much but…it’s the only true benefit of immortality. The rest of it wore thin a ways back. I’m very sorry for your loss, Sam.”

“Liar.”

“No, my dear frienemie; I'm many wretched things but I'm not a liar. You see, your brother may have gone a tad pre-cirrhotic, well on his way to Fat Elvis in the end but the Righteous Man could still hunt like no other. You should have heard the cheer that went up when my team got word he’s gone.”

“They cheered?”

“Respectfully,” Crowley pulled up a chair and sought out his eyes to make sure he was being understood. “With great, deep relief. And that’s the problem, isn’t it? The balance of power shifts, now that perhaps the strongest hunter ever is gone. And the balance of power, it's been good lately - for Heaven, for Earth, and most importantly of course for me. So now? This peace you sacrificed your marriage for? It demands yet one more thing of you. Namely your sweet Lily.”

“No. No goddamned way.”

“Yes, very much goddamned way. It’s time for a Woman of Letters to run this place- to take up the call to arms. So you will drag her feathery ass out of that Ivy League school you dropped her in last month, and bring her education back here to the bunker or… you can wait. Yes, you can wait and do it the messy, bloody, ugly way later - live to regret it. So very much. Sound familiar? Sound like the truth, Moose?”

He did lose it then, head in hands, lungs fighting to keep up with his tears.

“There, there…” Crowley put a comforting hand on his shoulder and chuckled when it was flung off. “You’re halfway to acceptance. The rest should be quite the breeze. See you around, mate. Looking forward to working together against each other again. Missed you like oxygen.”

Sam slept in the bunker that night, tuned up the Impala the next morning and then drove east. He had a feeling Lily wouldn’t be surprised to see him. Not even a little. Because this was where this had been going – always.

And who knew? Maybe he’d see Cas again, now, after all.


End file.
